


The Slumber of Summer

by lyrithim



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Constructive Criticism Welcome, F/M, Fake/Pretend Relationship, M/M, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-15
Updated: 2014-07-31
Packaged: 2018-02-09 01:11:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,593
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1963326
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lyrithim/pseuds/lyrithim
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Because Nick Fury would have been as good a CEO as he was a spy organization director, SHIELD agent vacations are pretty much smaller missions in pleasanter settings.</p><p>Steve wasn’t going to complain about spending two weeks at a California resort with Natasha, Clint, and a newly recommissioned Bucky—until Fury informed him that he was going to act as a couple with his best friend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Resort with the French Name

**Author's Note:**

> Implied torture/noncon for Bucky's past.

There was a war brewing in Steve and Bucky’s apartment.

“Red shell red shell red shell—yes!” Bucky shouted, pumping a fist into the air, as Steve’s head bowed in shame. The golden “1st” letters were emblazoned across his side of the screen the moment his character, a green dragon whose name Steve could not quite recall, sped across the finish line.

“I was so close,” Steve said, stunned.

“Ah, but not close enough, punk,” Bucky said, ruffling Steve’s hair. “You should think twice before you challenge me in Mario Kart again.”

“I will never understand how you’re able to beat me in the game when you’ve only started playing last week.”

“Well,” he said, heading toward to fridge, “I suppose that’s one of the advantages of beng young and sprightly.”

"I am one year older than you,” said Steve. “One year.” Not to mention that their current set of games was passed on to them by Mrs. Lowery next door, who must have been at least eighty and had dozens of video game trophies lined next to her china cabinet.

As part of their video game policy, Steve, the loser, went around the living room area to pick up video game controllers and popcorn scraps. At the same time, though, he was keeping a careful eye on Bucky, who was pouring himself a glass of orange juice with his non-prosthetic arm—they would need to visit the supermarket every day, by the rate Bucky was downing the entire thing—and giving Steve a detailed description of the last four seconds of the game. His shirt was all rucked up to the side, and his hands were engaged in such animate gesticulations that the glass of orange juice looked precariously close to splashing against the fridge several times. The shadows underneath his eyes, a relic of his time in Russia, looked all but gone, and Bucky was smiling, a grin not quite as wide as the ones he had given Steve in their first years of acquaintance, but Steve loved it all the same.

“Alright, alright,” he said, when the last of the popcorn was picked up. “I was there. Right behind of you, in fact. You don’t have to give me a blow-by-blow.”

“I am giving you advice, young grasshopper,” said Bucky. “So that you’ll have a chance against me next time.”

“We’ll see about next time,” Steve huffed.

The phone rang. Bucky stiffened slightly in surprise before Steve placed a hand of his shoulder.

“Should be just Sam or SHIELD people,” said Steve.

“I know. It just—just surprised me a bit, that’s all.”

Steve nodded and went to pick up the phone.

“Hello?”

“Hi, gramps.”

Steve groaned. “Natasha, did Bucky set you up to this?”

“I did not,” Bucky said, at the same time Natasha said, “Yep,” which did nothing to suppress Steve’s suspicions.

“I’m calling because Fury has a new assignment for us—you, me, James, and Clint. “

“So many of us?” Steve asked as Bucky raised an eyebrow. “What kind of mission is it?”

He swore he could hear the smile in Natasha’s voice. “We’re going to a resort.”

—

Because Nick Fury would have been as good a CEO as he was a spy organization director, SHIELD agent vacations are pretty much smaller missions in pleasanter settings.

“I personally do not agree with the concept of vacations when it comes to spies,” Fury announced as he began circling the room. Steve and Bucky stood a little straighter, as people were wont to do in Fury’s presence. “If you have the devotion to come to SHIELD, then you should dedicate yourself to the organization until the day of retirement. That is my belief—and it’s not as if the downtime isn’t vacation enough. However, after several conferences with several notable people, it has been decided that agents are in fact human beings, and human beings need breaks. Therefore, we reached a compromise. Though what you are about to receive is technically a state-sponsored vacation, you still have a mission and a goal. You are expected to fulfill this mission and this goal. The job comes first. Just because you happen to be in a pretty location does not mean you should run off frolicking with the deers and fail in fulfilling your duty as protectors of this state and its people. Do you understand?”

“Yessir,” they chanted in unison. They had all heard versions of this speech several times since the start of their careers.

Fury had finished his circling and returned to his seat. Reclining against the back of his chair, he regarded them severely. “Very well. Your files are on the table. Natasha, care to explain to them the gist of the mission?”

Natasha nodded and faced them. “We are to investigate a resort named Sommeil de L'Été—yes, I know, tacky. A few of our agents in the closest branch have already identified the place to be a front for various organized crime activities—mostly the trafficking of Schedule I and II drugs to white-collar clientele, and maybe a bit of money laundering here and there.”

“So basically, we’re doing a drug bust for rich people?” Clint asked. “Doesn’t the FBI usually handle this sort of stuff?”

“A bit underwhelming, isn’t it?” Fury said. “Is that a complaint I hear?”

“Oh, no sir,” Clint said, a cheeky grin in place. “Not at all, sir.”

Steve saw Bucky coughing against the back of his fist to disguise his laugh.

Fury sighed. “You have two weeks to complete the mission. Like all covert missions, you will take on a fictional identity during this time. Most of the details behind your identities, as well as exact goals of the assignment, are included in the file. For now, know that you are divided into two teams: Agent Romanoff and Agent Barton will be known as the Robins, and Agent Rogers and Agent Barnes will be the Armstrongs. Your names have already been registered at the resort. Invent marital problems and other background information as necessary, and… Yes, Rogers?”

“Sir,” he said, adding a nervous smile, “when you said Bucky and I will become the Armstrongs, you do mean as siblings?”

“No. Marital problems, Rogers. Most siblings do not have marital problems with each other.”

Natasha was looking at him with a raised eyebrow and an unidentifiable expression, while Bucky had his head down, eyes on the ground.

Steve had heard of undercover assignments where two agents acted as being romantically involved, of course—those were one of stories most in demand during agents’ offtimes, often accompanied with mock accusations of “He was undoubtedly the worst kisser I had ever made out with next to a weapons’ smuggler” or “We were dancing _ten feet away_ from the mob boss, and she stepped on my feet so often that I had trouble keeping an eye on him.” Rumors of romantic involvement would bloom and die with the agents involved within a month’s time.

If Steve remembered correctly, Bucky had taken one such mission as a junior agent, up in Canada—to this day, he and Steve remained a good friend of Bucky’s then-partner, Dum Dum Dugan. On the other hand, Steve had always been told that, while his stealth and hand-to-hand combat skills were superb, he could not tell a lie to save his life, and he was content in the knowledge that none of the higher-ups would ever ask him to act coupley with another agent.

Until now.

“Is this a problem?” Fury asked, straightening. “Because if I recall correctly, you did put Agent Barnes as your preferred partner for covert missions.”

Steve had put Bucky as his preferred partner for every sort of mission. In the six years he had been with SHIELD, he had never changed the form. Not even during Bucky’s disappearance.

“No, sir. Sorry, sir, I meant—is it necessary, that Bucky and I act as,” he swallowed, “husbands?”

Inwardly, he cringed and waited for Fury ripping him a new one for questioning orders. The director intertwined his fingers across his stomach and leaned back.

“You are about to enter one of the most expensive resorts in America,” he stated, “which, in addition to hosting one of the richest criminals, costs roughly one thousand dollars a night.” There were choking sounds coming from Clint’s direction, followed by Natasha thumping his back. “The whole mission for the four of you costs more than a year of tuition at goddamn Harvard. Now, Sommeil ain’t the sort of place where you’d call the receptionist and ask for a reservation. We had to convince two couples to give up their reservations, and let me tell you, people, even those who sleep on top of dollar bills at night, don’t part with thirty grand easy. So unless this situation will hinder your ability to work this case, no, we cannot afford changing any more details. Is that clear, agent?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. The mission begins tomorrow. Dismissed.”

—

Bucky was quiet on the way home. He stared out the cab’s window with the same square jaw and steely eyes as when he had marched into a Hydra base two years ago to trade his life for Steve’s. In the past year, Steve had learned more of Bucky’s facial expressions, the small tells of a raised eyebrow or a tight swallow, than he had in the rest of their acquaintance; so had Bucky for Steve. Sam liked to joke that the only people who could communicate better telepathically than him and Bucky were Clint and Natasha, who Sam was not sure were human. But Sam was far from correct—if Steve could truly read his best friend’s mind, there wouldn’t be times like these, when the few inches between them might as well as be made of bricks.

Steve touched Bucky’s hand to draw him out of whatever foul thoughts his mind had been in. When Bucky turned to look at him, Steve raised his eyebrows and jutted his chin toward the door. Bucky considered a few moments before nodding.

“Sir,” Steve called out to the driver, “this corner here is fine.”

When they were out in the New York streets again, the air around them cold and damp and dirty and free, they settled into a pace slow enough that normally Bucky would bring up the “old man” comments again. Instead, as they passed a hot dog vendor, Bucky asked, “What did you want to talk about?” His voice came out a low, still monotone.

“About the mission,” Steve said, “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry for what?” A hint of surprise now colored his voice.

“I know you’re not exactly comfortable with physical contact after,” he gestured to the sky, “you know. And it looks like you’re going to have to endure a lot of that during this assignment.”

“Oh.” Bucky stopped walking, and Steve rounded back. The slight widening of Bucky’s eyes indicated more surprise. “Is that why you tried—?”

Steve ducked his head a little. “Yeah.”

“Shit, Rogers.” Bucky was grinning again, and even though Steve had no idea what had changed his best friend’s mood so abruptly, he found himself grinning back. “You considerate bastard. You really know how to make a man feel special, don’t you?”

“So… you’re fine with it?”

The grin softened around the edges into a maybe-gentle, maybe-sad smile. Steve had yet to fully identify this emotion of Bucky’s.

“Yeah,” Bucky said, sidestepping a pile of grayed snow. “Yeah. If it’s you, I’m fine. If it’s you, I’m always fine, you idiot.”

“Oh.” Steve thought his heart was having a meltdown, he felt so happy. “Alright, then. I thought—I mean, sorry, I shouldn’t have assumed—”

“What, you were going to ask whether I might get triggered by another man touching me, in front of the director?” Bucky snorted. Then he smiled and shook his head. “Nah, Steve. Fury knew what he was doing. You’re good.” Then: “But are _you_ fine with it?”

 _Too fine with it_ , Steve wanted to say. This eagerness of his disgusted himself.

“Nat and Sam always call us an old married couple anyway, so that part shouldn’t be a problem,” he said, knowing that he wasn’t really answering the question and found that he couldn’t. “Anyway, the mission itself should be fun. The last time we went anywhere near California was—”

“Oh god,” Bucky groaned, “don’t you dare repeat the Las Vegas story. I swear I still have a hangover from that night.”

“So does that hooker, I suppose.”

Steve expertly dodged the ball of sludge that flew his way and ran all the way back to their apartment laughing.

That night, after phoning Sam, who was in a classified location in East Europe tracing the remnants of a local alien nest (“Slime, Rogers. So much slime.”) and who was understandably jealous of their upcoming “mission,” Steve and Bucky went over their cover stories. SHIELD had nailed down several things for them, including their last names, which Steve thought was a bit unfortunate, but Bucky had snickered through the irony.

“Armstrong, Steve,” Bucky said, grinning. “Jesus. Just wait until the resort’s hotel staff makes the connection.”

Other unchangeables included occupation (Steve was a high school art teacher; Bucky was a Silicon Valley entrepreneur), income level (Bucky’s was a few times higher than Steve’s), and a set of clothes for each of the fourteen days (“So we don’t look too much like peasants,” Bucky said knowingly). There was a list of suggestions, such as “length of marriage: six years” and “company product: solar panels,” most of which they ended up taking.

There were no suggestions for their romantic history. Bucky explained that agents often make use of their real history to build up this part, because SHIELD had apparently conducted studies years ago that showed that SHIELD-provided romantic histories came out much less natural than whatever the agents would improvise.

Steve thought this would be the most difficult part of the process, but in fact, their story churned itself out easily. Steve and James Armstrong were childhood and high school sweethearts, though they never told anyone due to obvious reasons. After high school, Bucky went off to fight the war in Iraq while Steve, who had been as frail as a stick most of his life, stayed in the States to complete his college education. Throughout the years, they wrote each other letters and managed to live through Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell in such a way. When Bucky completed his last deployment, he returned to America, received his associate degree, and started a business that, in a few years, made him one of the richest men in California. But most importantly, he was able to reunite with Steve, now a high school art teacher, and marry him before the passage of Prop 8.

It was all very sad and sweet, and Steve was sure Bucky could charm the pants off anyone with their backstory.

After they finished reviewing, however, Bucky suddenly said, “It works out too perfectly.”

“What does?”

He nodded at the notes Steve had jotted down during brainstorming. “These people. They’ve been together since they were small, don’t break up through time or distance, and end up married in the nick of time. And this Bucky guy just, what, magically adjusts to a missing arm, transitions back to civilian life, sets up a highly successful business, gets hitched—all within a year? That’s just too convenient.”

“Yeah, it might look that way,” Steve said carefully, “but ordinary people do amazing things every day.”

He wanted to say, You _have already done amazing things_ , but Bucky wouldn’t react well to that, so Steve placed the words back into the jar in the back of his mind, along with all the other compliments he didn’t want Bucky to throw away.

“Yeah.” Bucky looked at Steve. “Yeah, you’re right. Ignore me. I’m just tired and cranky that we have to wake up at five tomorrow morning.” He stretched. “God, is it hard being a spy.”

“I think we’re mostly done here anyway,” said Steve. “You can go to sleep if you want. I want to look at the mission objectives one more time. Something about it was bugging me earlier.”

“Alright, dear Mr. Armstrong, don’t stay up too long.” Without warning, Bucky looped an arm around Steve’s shoulder and pressed his lips against his hair. Then, from his bedroom, Bucky called out, “Just think. By this time tomorrow, we’ll be in a honest-to-God _resort_!” Then his door slammed shut.

For a long while, Steve could not remember why he was staring at the mission information folder.

—

Clint was drooling as he snored in the backseat. Bucky had lasted five minutes awake in the car before he, too, fell prey to the claws of sleep; his head was now slumped against Clint’s shoulder. Natasha sat to the left hand side, her arms crossed against her chest. Every now and then she began blinking owlishly at the front before she shook herself and straightened her spine. She gave Steve a glare whenever she caught him looking at her through the rear view mirror. Steve would grin back.

Outside, flurries of snow—or, as Bucky often liked to call them, “God’s dandruff”—danced through the air in a sort of Hollywood-Christmas way. The January snowfall had reached record levels this year, and there was concern the day before that they would have to borrow a snowmobile or helicopter to get to their destination in time. But thankfully, snow had begun clearing up an hour or so before they hit the road, and the JFK airport remained open.

Agent Sharon Carter acted as their final mission-briefer and was currently the one manning the car. She and Steve settled into a light chat after the usual identity-checks, which involved a lot of metal detectors and a series of questions proving that they were 1) the person their face claimed to be 2) human.

“So, this would be your first full-time covert op, am I right?” Sharon asked.

“Yeah,” Steve said.

“You worried?”

“A little.”

“Don’t be,” she said, her eyes still on the road. “This is supposed to be a vacation. Enjoy yourself. Take down the baddy and save the day, as you always do. ’Sides…” She smiled. “Barnes is back, isn’t he? And hasn’t he always been your safety net?”

There was no bitterness in her tone, only a slight teasing, and Steve dipped his head, acknowledging the truth of her statement.

“How are you two, anyway?” she asked. “Still in the ‘desperately yearning for each other but too chicken do anything about it’ stage?”

“He doesn’t feel that way,” Steve said quietly.

In the back, Natasha tilted her head toward the window. This was her way of saying she was trying not to listen, but Steve doubted anything he and Sharon were about to say was news to SHIELD’s best.

“But you don’t know for sure,” Sharon said. “And you will never know for sure until you ask him.”

“Yeah, but—”

“Don’t you think your friendship can stand it?” she asked. “Even if you’re rejected, do you think Barnes would really mind? It’s silly, Steve, the way you’re dancing around each other. We’re spies, or governmental agents or whatever, and things like romance should be the least of our concerns.” Her knuckles flared white, then her fists relaxed. With a more resigned tone, she said, “Wouldn’t it be better to know for sure than teasing yourself with the possibility every day?”

Many things had changed when Bucky was officially categorized as MIA in the SHIELD books. One of them was Steve’s perspective on his feelings for Bucky. Once he realized that he had, in fact, been in love, stupidly and obliviously in love, with his best friend all this time, he could no longer in his good conscience continue his relationship with Sharon.

“Don’t apologize, Steve,” she said. “I see your apologizing face, and I’m not having it. There are things in life that you can never make up for, and whatever happened between us was not one of them.”

She smiled, and Steve smiled back. Save for the occasional small talk and Clint’s snoring, they traveled the rest of the way to the JFK in companionable silence. Later, after Sharon kicked them out of her car at the terminal entrance, she hugged Steve goodbye then turned to Bucky and, to everyone’s surprise, gave him a hug as well. Bucky looked a little dazed as Sharon drove off and turned to Steve to ask him if he was still dreaming.

Their passports, which SHIELD had issued with their fake names, went through security without problem. Their real luggage, which contained enough weaponry to incite a massive airport-wide lockdown, were to be delivered to them at baggage claim. As they waited for their flight, the four of them practiced syncing their backstories. Natasha was to be a wealthy surgeon, and Clint was her former Olympic candidate trophy husband.

“And what kind of sport did you represent?” Bucky asked.

“Archery, of course,” Clint replied.

“With that kind of skill?”

The two sharpshooters then dived straight into the familiar argument regarding each other’s relative skill level. Natasha sat a few seats away, steadfastly ignoring them as she reviewed her medical knowledge on an e-reader.

Steve’s hands were shaking when he entered the long tube that led to the airplane’s entrance. He had always had an aversion for planes, even when he was little and had no idea what a plane was. Sam had jokingly said that Steve or one of his ancestors must have had bad experiences with planes in his past life. Bucky had scoffed at the idea, though Steve secretly found himself agreeing with Sam.

Bucky placed his hand around Steve’s as the plane took off the runway, and Steve felt himself forgetting every bit of the surrounding. The tension eased out of him almost immediately. The best part was, Bucky did not even tease him until they landed in Santa Barbara, California.

“Still scared of flying metal crates, punk?” Bucky asked. If they were still back in high school, Bucky would take this chance to give Steve a noogie. Seeing as Steve was now a head taller, Steve received a punch on the shoulder instead.

“Watch out for that Brooklyn twang, Mr. Armstrong,” Natasha said as she and Clint returned from baggage claim.

In response, Bucky planted a hand on his hip and said, in the most exaggerated Valley Girl accent, “Oh my god, ’Tasha, just, like, mind your own business, okay?”

Steve laughed, but he was nothing compared to Clint, who had to sling an arm around Natasha's shoulders as he practically shouted his laughter.

California was almost mockingly sunny when Steve compared it to the blizzard his neighbors must be getting. The air was chilly enough that the pedestrians outside the cab still had their jackets on, but once or twice the car would pass by men who swaggered down the streets in shorts and sunglasses.

“We’ve been stuck in snow for so long, I forgot what real sunshine looks like,” Bucky commented.

The four of them arrived at a motel a few miles away from the Sommeil to meet up with their handlers. Steve had expected just some junior SHEILD-CA agent in need of more observation hours to greet them, but to his surprise, when they opened the door to Room 214, whose keys Sharon had handed them earlier, it was Agent Coulson who greeted them.

“Good morning, agents,” he said, shaking each of their hands firmly, though Steve thought he received a few extra jiggles. “I hope the journey has been well.”

Inside 214, which was definitely connected to at least two other rooms, were at least a dozen SHIELD agents, making calls and scrambling about with arms full of papers. As he placed his bags on the floor, Steve had to dodge a woman with dark makeup smudges around her eyes as she stomped toward a cluster of computers in a corner. No one was in a suit.

“Thanks, Phil,” Steve said, “and it’s not that I don’t want to see you here, but I’m a bit surprised. Isn’t this a little below your pay grade? And this entire setup—” He gestured at the room.

“We’re wrapping up a six-months long investigation dealing with a different case, a weapons dealer a little north of here. I’m just here to help you guys out on the side.”

“Wonderful.” Steve grinned. “I can’t imagine a better handler to watch our backs.”

“Oh, that’s— I mean, this is— Thank you, Captain, I—”

Bucky took pity. “So this motel, I’m guessing it’s one of the SHIELD’s secret bases.”

“Yes,” Coulson said immediately. “We’re not listed on the local pages or known to the area’s residents, and the road here, as you no doubt had noticed, is closed. If a family accidentally passes through these parts, however, we are still very hospitable.”

“Damn straight,” yelled out an agent in the back. “My pancakes are fucking perfect.”

“We do have a four-point-five rating on Yelp,” Coulson allowed.

They went over their mission goals, which were simple: they were to keep a lookout for one Alexander Pierce, the manager of the Sommeil's main hotel and set up surveillance around possible dealer-client locations. Through the accounts of multiple independent but anonymous sources, Coulson said, SHIELD had confirmed Pierce to be the leader of a massive drug empire, so Steve and the others were to hold off arrests until they gathered enough indisputable evidence to bring down Pierce and what would no doubt be a team of silver-tongued lawyers.

After that, the morning passed more signing of paperwork, more equipment checks, and more backstory edits before Coulson was satisfied enough to allow them to dress for their entrance. Clint, Bucky, and Steve came out of an adjoining room wearing a combination of name-brand sweater-vests, polos, khaki shorts, and leather shoes while Natasha twirled around in a significantly less stifling summer dress. Her expression was smug.

They bid their goodbyes to Coulson then headed to Sommeil in a black Benz, the sight of which led to Bucky and Clint simultaneously letting out wolf-whistles. After an intense game of rock-paper-scissors, Natasha took her seat in front of the wheel while Clint claimed shotgun.

They began to adjust to their characters, which SHIELD ordered to be as much of a stereotype of their jobs as possible in order to draw away suspicion. Natasha allowed her own tone to become more solemn, more fitting of the typical got-a-scalpel-up-my-ass surgeon. Clint played up his part as the doting, adoring husband. He would periodically curl a stray strand of her hair behind her ear, or lay a small kiss on her cheek and grin when she raised an eyebrow. The changes were not large, and not for the first time Steve wondered about the nature of their relationship status.

Bucky was checking some sort of financial report on his SHIELD-provided smartphone before he rolled his eyes and stuffed the phone back in his pocket. Then he cleared his throat, tightened his tie, adjusted his watch, smoothed down his shirt, straightened his back, and began a series of gestures toward the back of Natasha's seat. Steve tried to stifle his laughs, but Bucky noticed anyway.

"It's unfair," Bucky said, long-suffering. "For my first assignment, I had to fake a Cambodian accent and wear a ballerina getup for two days, and those shoes were _painful_. You don’t have to do anything. You pretty much fit the stereotype of the typical teacher anyway."

"Really? How?" Steve asked, curious that there was such a stereotype.

“Polite, proper, confident. And also, the whole ‘I genuinely believe in everyone’s potential’ thing you have going on. People will have no problem believing that you tutor at-risk kids in your spare time and receive bundles of thank-you cards come June. You’re the living embodiment of that one teacher from every inspirational high school movie who points the main character kid to the right direction. You’re—” The corner of Bucky's mouth twitched. “—too good for that other Armstrong, the one who ran off to Iraq and left you behind.”

“No, Buck, I—”

“Wow, I can totally imagine Steve as Robin Williams in that one movie,” Clint mused. Natasha punched him. “Ow, what did I do wrong?”

When Steve looked Bucky’s way again, Bucky had drawn out his cell phone and was flicking through each spreadsheet with renewed vigor. Fine, if Bucky was choosing to retreat behind his character, then Steve was going Armstrong too. He laced his fingers with Bucky’s and laid a kiss on his knuckles. Bucky went still but did not push him away. Then, feeling bolder, Steve leaned in.

“You’re the best man I have ever known,” he whispered, as he did every day, aloud or not, in every way he knew was possible.

And Bucky closed his eyes briefly, to hide himself from Steve’s words, as he did every time. His grip on Steve’s hand, however, tightened before he let go.

“Thanks, dear,” Bucky said easily, kissing Steve’s nose. His smirk returned. “Though let’s save all that for the hotel room, shall we?”

He then returned to his phone. Clint finally sensed that something was wrong with the scene and started rambling about giraffe courting habits. Through the rearview mirror, Natasha raised an eyebrow at Steve—in sympathy, he knew—but he shook his head. For his part, Steve held onto the rest of his speech, dropping them back in that jar in his mind that was now filling to the brim. At the same time, he felt emptier than ever.


	2. The Great Fakeout Makeout

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> St + Bu =marriage counseling=>

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My joy comes from embarrassing my favorite characters and receiving your guys’ love and support. With this story, I have both. Thank you to everyone who commented on, kudo’d on, subscribed to, bookmarked, lurked around, etc. this story.
> 
> Warnings include purposeful exhibitionism (nothing above the T rating) and potential secondhand embarrassment as our heroes continue to make questionable decisions. An original character is featured heavily near the end of this chapter, though her future appearances will be shorter.

Sommeil de l’Été was a giant, sprawling village across the lap of the Santa Barbara hills. At its head was the forty-story-tall Olympus Hotel, a shining marble-and-steel structure that proudly held straight at the resort entrance. Behind the Olympus dotted tiny villas, knitted together by sandy white roads. The Sommeil was divided into several villas, each with a different theme dedicated to a Greek deity, despite the resort’s decidedly French name; Natasha and Clint would be staying at the Demeter House, and Steve and Bucky at the Poseidon House. For decades, the resort catered to the richest and most idle, who spent their days and money traversing through nature in search of an escape from what was undoubtedly an inexorably stressful upper class life.

Then again, dope was also involved, which could contribute to the resort’s popularity.

“Reminds me of Budapest,” Clint commented as they drove into a winding road uphill.

Natasha considered the scene for a moment and said, “Not enough gunfire.”

For acres around the Robins’ cottage, rows and rows of apple trees stood sentry. The outside of the cottage was decorated with mosaics depicting cornucopias full of harvest goods, farmers with straw hats, and other aspects of rustic country life. A small fountain greeted them as they drove through a tunnel of grape vines.

When Natasha and Clint exited the car, three attendants were already waiting at the entrance and unloaded their luggage—the real one, with Natasha's full collection of throwing stars and Clint’s top nine bows—at expert speed. Now in full covert mode, the Robins waved goodbye at Steve and Bucky as Clint clung to Natasha's arm and was practically rubbing his face against her shoulder. When they drove out of sight, Steve and Bucky had to pull over; their laughing rendered them a menace to the road. The moment chilled quickly, and they were soon back to chatting about the weather and the stock market and Steve's latest imaginary trouble with the students in his classes.

Their path carved downward through a field of flowers, which in turn gave way to sparser, rougher grass that dotted an expanse of white sand. They entered a dip of land, at the end of which was a small one-story house that jutted against the lapping waves. One of the walls was entirely made of glass.

Bucky whistled. “Sure looks better than the brochure. Nat and Clint are gonna be so jealous.”

“It is very beautiful,” Steve agreed. Already he was itching to break out his art supplies.

Like before, the Sommeil staff immediately brought out their luggages, though this time a valet drove the car away for parking.

“Here, sorry, I’ll help—” Steve said.

The man shook his head and smiled. “Sir, it’s fine. I’m happy to be of service,” he said as he and his partner carried them into the house.

 _This is impossible_ , Steve thought. The luxury of it all was making him dizzy.

“Steve,” Bucky called, motioning him closer. “You need to hear this.”

Bucky looped an arm around Steve's waist when he drew near. Steve felt his heart stutter.

“Mr. Armstrong,” the short, dark-haired woman said, bowing her head in acknowledgement. “My name is Beatrice Santiago. I am the manager of Poseidon House. I was just going over your schedules.”

“Can you repeat the bit on marriage counseling?” Bucky asked, voice tight.

“Oh yes!” Beatrice exclaimed. “The program will take place every other day from eight to nine-thirty in the morning. Your first session starts tomorrow at the Eros wing of the Olympus Hotel. Your counselor is Dr. Brenda Singh, who will be willing to help you for as long as necessary.”

“I see,” said Steve carefully, his mind buzzing.

Beatrice beamed. “All other information is available in the email I’ve sent you, though if you switch to electronics-free instead, Sommeil will provide written copies for everything. I see here that you have switched to meals at the Olympus last week. If you sirs wish to change your mind, however, Sommeil will be happy to accommodate.”

“No, no, it’s fine,” said Steve. “Thank you so much for everything.”

“Your pleasure is our delight!” she chirped.

Beatrice bowed steeply before she bounced to a golf cart labeled staff-only. With the other two staff members, she drove up the hill and out of sight.

“Marriage counseling,” Bucky was saying into the phone as Steve rounded the spacious living room again for bugs and hidden cameras. “Nothing in the files mentioned marriage counseling.”

“The whole house is clear,” Steve declared, crawling out from underneath the coffee table, which he was pretty sure was made of some sort of impractically expensive wood. “I’ll be connecting to Coulson now.”

Bucky gave him a thumbs-up as he switched his grip on the phone. “Of course it’s from the real Armstrongs. Nat, you know how Fury is with SHIELD finances. No way he would… uh-huh… uh-huh… Yeah—no, I’m not making a big deal out of this. I looked over our schedule, and everything but this hour-and-half syncs up. We’re wasting time with some voodoo shrink when we can be— You don’t have to remind me that it’s a vacation. Look, I don’t even know why I’m consulting you and Clint on this. I’m canceling this… Okay… Alright… Fine. Yeah, bye.” He slammed down the receiver. “The good old Robins down by the Demeter House have advised us to _not_ cancel our counseling appointments immediately.”

“Why not?”

“Natasha counted up the hours. Meals are an hour each at the main hotel, and while we can spend the free time slots in our schedules however we want, it’s best if we swim with the dolphins or whatever instead of lounging around the lobby all the time. Said it avoids suspicion.”

Coulson recommended more or less the same thing over the wires, which came as close to a command as a handler could give. When Bucky shut down the communications, stony silence filled the room.

“No way around it, I suppose,” Steve finally said. “Should we start planning marital problems now?”

“No,” Bucky said. “We’re not going to waste any more time on this than necessary. There’s something we can do.”

“What is it?”

“That woman—Beatrice Santiago—mentioned that Dr. Singh is willing to help us, and I quote, ‘for as long as necessary,’ which means...”

Steve repeatedly asked if Bucky was truly, truly fine with what he proposed. Bucky said he was, with no slight firmness, so Steve believed him. But he couldn’t stop fretting. While they focused on the blueprint of Sommieil’s main hotel and planned basic routes for the infiltration of its ventilation system, Steve gave him so many sidelong glances Bucky asked if he had sprained his neck.

Thanks to the impressive speed of Sommeil’s golf carts, Steve and Bucky made it to dinner early. The Olympus Hotel served to non-resort customers and hosted weddings and other celebrations, as well as an incredible buffet. Clint and Bucky began stuffing themselves upon entry.

“I don’t even know what I just put in my mouth but it’s so _good_ ,” Clint said. Or at least that was what Steve assumed he said; the words were slightly muffled. “This place is magical.”

Several guests walking past looked scandalized. The looks came so frequently, and from so many of the same people, Steve wondered if they rounded the dessert counter a few times more just to sneer at them.

The four of them discussed their plans for the week, switching to code whenever someone came too close to their table. For the night, they were to split up in pairs and start scanning the first couple of floors, especially areas Coulson had marked as suspicious—nothing too strenuous or illegal yet. For the rest of the conversation, they gushed about their plans for the vacation bits of their mission. Natasha and Clint were going to take horseback riding lessons (and most likely outstripping the instructor in the process) while Bucky and Steve, at the other two’s suggestion, agreed to take up snorkeling.

Seeing Natasha and Clint smushed against each other like two lovers on their honeymoon still made Steve’s head spin. On one hand, Steve had heard enough of their “Budapest” references to know that they had a great deal of history, perhaps a romantic one. On the other, they were Clint and Natasha. After the whole fiasco with Twitter and Facebook and Instagram—which everyone in SHIELD had thought for _sure_ was Tony’s act—Steve had learned not to underestimate their acting skills. Steve often thought them as the only people who could propose to each other in public and still make others question their relationship status.

When their after-dinner surveillance yielded no surprises, the four of them headed back to their respective houses with the promise to also “survey” the pool area behind the hotel the next morning. Back in the Poseidon House, Steve fired off the daily report to Coulson and changed out of his itchy suit, only to find that there was one sole bed present in the master bedroom.

That was, the one sole bed in the one sole bedroom in this mind-numbingly expensive resort house.

“I will _not_ , Nat,” Bucky said, a cup of orange juice in his hand. He clenched the phone between his shoulder and ear and adjusted the towel around his hips. When he caught Steve looking, Bucky threw him a saucy wink. All of the blood in Steve's body flooded to his face. “No, he’s—” He switched his phone to the other ear, farther away from Steve. “That’s ridiculous. You must have drunk too much at the salad bar, Dr. Robin. We’ll see you tomorrow.”

When Bucky switched off the phone, Natasha was still laughing riotously on the other side.

“What did she say?”

“Something your poor old gramps ears can’t bear to hear,” Bucky said. “Now, I need to— Ah.” He was looking at the bed, face tight.

“I’ll take the sofa. I wanted to watch some news anyway. It’s good to—”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Bucky set his glass on the dresser and jumped onto the mattress, which bounced a few times. “This thing is at least six times as big as what we had when we were young, and it doesn’t smell like mold.”

“But—”

“And there’s a TV right there,” Bucky said, pointing at the large flat-screen right underneath a life-size painting of the Greek sea god. “C’mon, Steve. I’m not fragile.”

“I’ve never thought that of you.”

Bucky made his best wounded puppy face. “What, do I snore too loudly?”

Steve smiled. “I can hear you every damn night across the hall. But seriously—”

“How can we expect to act as though we’re in love when we can’t even share a bed?”

Steve considered that point for a long moment. He looked over to the door, then at Bucky, before finally conceding that Bucky would no doubt find a way to drag him back anyway. He said as much when he climbed in, and Bucky laughed.

“Was that so bad?” Bucky drawled after a few seconds of silence.

“The bed is good,” Steve admitted. “The company, though...”

Bucky kicked him.

A window above them opened directly to the night sky, which was studded with twinkling stars. Outside, owls hooted into the chilly air, and waves crashed against the beach in soothing rhythm. Even though there was a foot’s distance between them, Steve still felt as though his veins were charged with electricity.

“I swear, you fool everyone with that yes-sir-no-sir attitude of yours,” Bucky was saying as he strained for something. “I despair every time a nice old lady falls for your charm—and I’m not talking about Sharon’s aunt. She saw through you immediately.”

Steve smiled fondly at the memory of Peggy. When Sharon had brought him to meet the old woman in the greet-the-family all those months ago, he had stuttered and tripped over his two feet within ten minutes of introductions. Peggy, who as one of the founders of SHIELD retained something of a godlike status, had raised an eyebrow as he almost crashed into her china cabinet, highly unimpressed.

“She seems to like me better after—” _I broke up with Sharon_ , he thought, and in retrospect maybe Peggy Carter did have a good reason to dislike him then “—after last Thanksgiving. She gave me some advice over Skype.”

“If you’re trying to make me jealous by telling me about how you’re BFF with a celebrity, it’s working.” The lamp was switched off. “But you know. I still got SHIELD’s most eligible bachelor to come to bed with me.”

“I thought we swore to never mention the auction. Wasn’t there a pact? I’m sure—”

Steve had rolled over to face his friend, and immediately regretted it. Somehow, Bucky’s easy grin seemed ever the more beautiful. There, shrouded in the dark, Steve felt braver, and that scared him.

“That’s revenge for the Las Vegas story,” Bucky said, his voice a whisper now. His lips curved into a wicked grin. “Captain America.”

“Jerk,” Steve breathed. His heartbeats chanted: he wanted, he wanted, he wanted.

The space between Bucky’s eyebrows was slightly wrinkled before he swallowed and reached across the space between them. Dumbfounded, and not quite sure he was still awake, Steve laid his hand a few inches from his shoulder and let Bucky entangle their fingers.

“’Night,” Bucky said, closing his eyes. “You’ll need all of the acting skills you can pull out of your ass first thing in the morning.”

In response, Steve gave Bucky’s hand a tight squeeze. Bucky smiled.

—

“’Morning,” Steve said as Bucky entered the room. He sipped his coffee and tried his hardest to not look at his friend, or think about how he had woken up in the other’s embrace.

“How can you be so chipper at…” Bucky squinted at a clock, “seven-thirty?”

“I actually woke up at six-thirty.”

“You and your freakish internal alarm clock.” He picked up an apple from the center of the table and rolled it back when he realized it was synthetic. “Ugh, they’re trying to starve us out, I swear. Let’s go to the main hotel and get some food. We’ll need to polish our characters too, now that that shrink’s gonna interrogate us.”

Once outside, Bucky grabbed onto the golf cart with his cybernetic hand. The other hand was extended toward Steve, who had nearly forgotten about the acting.

 _This is good_ , he thought, as his hand joined Bucky’s. His heart was no longer trying to break out of his ribcage, at least. He was becoming normalized to handholding.

“Hey,” he said, laughing, “I can get in the cart myse—”

Then Bucky pulled Steve toward him and, with his hands on Steve’s shoulders, kissed Steve on the corner of his lips.

Every nerve in Steve’s body was lit up in fireworks.

“Stop being an idiot and let other people be nice to you,” Bucky said. Their foreheads touched.

Steve was sure he was incredibly intelligible then, with his uh’s and ah’s and all.

Bucky’s lips were slightly agape, and his eyebrows drew together. “Steve, was that too much—?”

Steve placed his lips on Bucky’s chin for the briefest of moments—elation replaced by guilt within the same second—and managed to string together, “You should take your own advice sometimes.”

Bucky still looked faintly worried, though like Sam had said, Steve supposed he was one of the few in the world who could tell. Steve squeezed his friend's hand. They were alright. Steve's unwillingness to touch Bucky intimately could always be played off as an aversion to PDA.

But not here.

Outside of Dr. Singh's office after breakfast, Steve put his hands on Bucky's shoulders.

“Are you sure you're fine with this?” Steve asked. “One hundred percent?”

Bucky, who had hooked his fingers around Steve's belt, said, “We've gone over this. SHIELD and Coulson and, I strongly suspect, Nat have some sort of vendetta against us completing a mission without distractions. They are in charge of all of the credit card numbers used in this mission, and we might have our covers blown if the hotel staff suspect us to be card thieves. Which would make Fury extremely unhappy, and that would be terrifying for our wallets this month, considering the twins.”

“The twins?” Steve asked blankly.

“Rent and loans.”

“Ah. I see.”

“Conclusion: we act so incredibly in love that the therapist pronounces us cured and sets us off for water skiing and whatever. We can substitute ten and a half hours of embarrassment for at most half an hour, if the plan runs smoothly.”

“But I don’t want you to maybe feel, I don't know…”

“Alright. To settle your big heart once and for all, let me tell you this: Dr. X, my actual voodoo shrink, have told me that I should, and I quote, ‘take control of the big part of my sexuality left dormant after the last mission’—my big, sparkly, men-loving side, he meant—‘in a controlled setting.’ _This_ is a controlled setting. You I can trust with my life, soul, mind, body, virginity—assuming the last one is still intact, that is. You get it. I trust you, and I consent.” He circled his arms around Steve’s neck. His gaze was focused. “Now let me ask you: do you consent?”

“This is something you want.”

Bucky stilled for the briefest moment, then nodded. "I... haven't thought about it that way, but yeah."

“Then I consent as well.”

Bucky’s eyes lost that hard edge he always carried. He leaned in. “You’re amazing, Steve Rogers.”

They were actually going to go through with this, Steve thought, panicking.

Then the door next to them clicked open.

There was a moment where they were both staring at each other, and then in one swift motion, Bucky was pulling Steve down, pushing their lips together.

At this point, Steve was feeling more than slightly disconnected from the world around him, so sensations took over: the softness of Bucky's lips, the light scrape of stubble on Bucky's chin, the brush of their noses. A year of conscious desire and years of oblivious pining on Steve’s part—from when he knew nothing of desire to the day he finally realized that it had always been Bucky, some way or another—were breaking through the jail Steve had condemned them to, because Bucky was the best friend he ever had, and if Steve Rogers truly feared anything—

Bucky’s grip around Steve’s neck tightened, and he let out a moan that sent a shiver down Steve’s spine to all the right places. Steve’s mouth moved more aggressively, more hungrily. Bucky let go of Steve's hair and instead moved his hands farther down, trailing over Steve’s shoulders and arms, settling at last on either side of Steve’s hips—

Someone, someone who wasn’t Bucky and therefore registered very lowly on Steve’s importance scale at first, coughed, loud and obvious. Then Bucky was gone, leaving nothing but an ache even as he pulled Steve tightly by his side. Reality slammed back with all of its strength. The rational bits of his brain rained havoc on the rest of Steve’s psyche, both for participating in Bucky’s ridiculous plan and for becoming lost in the moment.

Over these feelings, and the sensation of being speared by a trident, Steve could hardly muster even embarrassment at the sight of a lady staring irritably while she tapped a foot against the floor.

“Dr. Singh,” Bucky said. Not a hair out of place, not a beat late. “Hey there. Didn’t see you.”

Her gaze, however, was focused on Steve, who remembered to smile just in time. Bucky was still pressed against Steve’s side, warm and inviting.

“Mr. and Mr. Armstrong. Just in time for the eight o’clock appointment,” she said, sounding as if she had much more important things to do than talk to two grown men who had been groping each other outside her door. “Please proceed into my office without any further mishaps.”

Her tone was good. Her annoyance was what Bucky had wanted to achieve, more or less. But her order was not.

Bucky seemed to sense this too, because as they headed through the door, he gave the laugh he pulled out for charming the pants out of people in his immediate vicinity, often drunk patrons of the local bar.

“Sorry for the display outside. Steve and I, we kind of lost track of time,” Bucky said as they sank into a clean white couch in the center of the room.

Dr. Singh looked highly unimpressed. “Believe me, that was hardly the first show I’ve witnessed.”

“Oh, about _that_ ,” Bucky said, sounding every bit the unapologetic millionaire he was supposed to play. “I apologize for wasting your time, but Steve and I actually just patched up our relationship. We’re very happy together. Sorry for your troubles, but we’ll be leaving now.”

Bucky looked prepared to stand up until Dr. Singh spoke up:

“Really? I’m afraid I don’t see a very happy couple in front of me right now.”

Bucky’s eyes narrowed. “Where did you get your credentials, exactly?”

Steve patted Bucky’s thigh. “Hey, uh, honey—”

“Harvard,” Dr. Singh said, before downing an entire cup of coffee in one go.

“Aren’t Harvard graduates above marriage counseling?” Bucky asked.

Dr. Singh smacked her lips. “I like you. You’re nouveau riche. What’s your business?”

“Nothing that concerns you,” Bucky snapped. “Look, there’s been a mistake in the books. Clearly Steve and I don’t need therapy, and if you will excuse us—”

“Steve, you’ve been quiet,” she commented lightly. “How long have you two been married?”

He was startled into a response: “Seven years this May.”

“Interesting. How long have you known each other?”

“Since high school,” Steve said, at the same time Bucky said, “Since we were kids.”

They glanced at each other.

“We started dating in high school,” Bucky reminded him. He looked at the therapist. “Our mothers were friends, and we were born within six months of each other. After they died, me and Steve lived together until I joined the army and went to Iraq in ’04.”

All true. Minus the part about dating, that was.

“Thank you, Mr. Armstrong,” Dr. Singh said, “for answering the question I directed to the other Mr. Armstrong.”

Bucky colored. Steve patted Bucky’s thigh some more.

“Right. To return to the scene I witnessed outside— Now, this,” she gestured her office, where at least a dozen grinning Cupids were painted across the walls, “as advertised by Sommeil, is a judgment-free zone. Judgment-free, that is, until I see some sort of problem that I, in my _professional_ opinion, simply must comment on.” She held up the notepad she had been scribbling on intermittently throughout the conversation. “Do you want to know what my professional opinion is, when I saw you outside?”

“Yes,” Steve said, at the same time Bucky gave a vehement, “No.”

Dr. Singh ignored Bucky and read from her notepad: “S. obviously stiff during PDA. B. may be coercing S. into non-consensual exhibitionism.”

“What?” Steve squawked, then tried to pass it off as a laugh. “Oh no, that’s not… It’s not…”

She waited patiently for him to finish, but in the end, flustered as he was, he could only gesture vaguely to the sky.

“B. rarely maintains eye-contact with S.; B. overrides S. in conversations, and S. lets him,” Dr. Singh continued, flipping to another page. “Issues observed: lack of communication, dysfunctional power dynamics, lack of communication, lack of understanding, lack of communication, lack of communication, lack of communication—and oh look, potential sexual incompatibility.”

Steve choked on his cup of water. “Ma’am,” he said weakly, “it really isn’t like that—”

“You can’t observe people for five minutes and figure out everything that’s wrong with them,” Bucky cut in. “The two of us are completely fine. We don’t need therapy, and we are _leaving_.”

“Then cancel the appointments,” Dr. Singh said airily. Bucky glowered at her but didn’t answer. “Call me a fraud in your head all you want, Mr. Armstrong, but you came here to prove something. You chose to tongue in front of my office, and you chose to cancel the appointments in person rather than through phone or email. The fact that you right now are on the verge of standing while your partner sits tells me that canceling the sessions is most likely _your_ idea. Adding those three factors to what I just witnessed since you two have entered my office, I am inclined to conclude that even though you insist that you don’t have relationship issues, you are insecure in your convictions and sought a professional to confirm that your relationship is still good and happy.”

“You are completely off-base,” Bucky said, smiling.

“So correct me,” she said. “Tell me what you believe is wrong with your relationship.”

“No. I think already have my fill of sharing-and-caring with strangers for the year.”

“So you do believe something is amiss,” she said, satisfied.

“Fine. Yes, I do have problems in mind!” Bucky pointed at Steve. “This guy over here. He’s patient, kind, sincere, whatever. He’s basically the most perfect fucking human being on the planet, and I have no idea what he’s doing with me.”

“How can you think that?” Steve said at once, aghast. “Why do you insist that I want nothing to do with you? Buck, you and I have been through so much...”

As usual, Steve’s declarations seemed to achieve the opposite of what he intended: Bucky turned away.

“You shouldn’t stay with me because of nostalgia. After Hy—Iraq, I’m telling you, Steve, the boy that you grew up with just isn’t here anymore. You need to accept that.”

“I love you,” Steve said firmly. Bucky closed his eyes for a few seconds but said nothing. “Who I was loved who you were. Who I am now love the you at the present. And I’m not some perfect guy. I’m just a kid from Brooklyn who happened to fall in love with the most infuriating asshole he’s ever met.”

“I—” Bucky made a frustrated noise. “Do you see what I mean? _This_ is the guy I have to deal with on a daily basis.”

“I apologize,” said Dr. Singh, who for the first time seemed genuinely interested in the two of them. “I side with the other Mr. Armstrong on this.”

“I killed people.” Bucky threw those words out like they were weapons, or shields.

“Under orders. In captivity. After torture. After drugs. Or after they threatened you with an entire village of people.” Though he held his tongue at “mind control,” Steve knew he had gone off the script. Bucky Armstrong, as far as they had planned, never had the skillset to be threatened by an ambiguous “they.”

“It doesn’t erase what I’ve done. I broke. I put my finger on the trigger. None of what you said matters.”

“Yes it does. It means that you’re not the monster you think you are.”

Bucky’s mouth opened and closed like a goldfish whose owner poked at it one too many times. In the end, he pressed his lips together and glared at the floor instead.

Steve’s heart wrenched painfully, but he counted this as a victory. This was the second day in a row where they went anywhere near the talk that they sorely needed, and unlike the day before, Bucky did not shut him down as soon as Steve began speaking.

Dr. Singh broke the silence that followed by clearing her throat.

“I think that is enough for the day,” she said, almost kindly. “I thank you two for coming here today. For the rest of today and tomorrow, my advice and your homework: communication. And lots of it. I’ll see you on the 8th.”


End file.
